Suspect Wanted in Fatal Belltown Collision Arrested This Morning

A man with an outstanding murder warrant was arrested early this morning after officers contacted him stealing a package of beef jerky from a Belltown store.

It was a little after midnight when the bicycle officers were patrolling the 1500 Block of 2nd Avenue. They were flagged down by an employee of Joe’s Mart, and told that the man standing next to him outside of the store had left the store without paying for the beef jerky he was currently holding. The employee asked officers if they would trespass the man from the store. The officers contacted the alleged shoplifter and asked him for his identification. The man stated he didn’t have any ID on him, and provided a name and date of birth. Record checks of that name and birthdate came back with no no record.

The officers kept asking the man if he had any other piece of identification with his name on it so they could establish his identity. The man told them he did not. Officers then saw that he was wearing a single dog tag around his neck and asked to look at that. The man agreed and showed them his dog tag. The name on the tag was different than the one he had provided earlier, but the man claimed it was his uncle.

A patrol officer in a car stopped by the location and the bike officers used the computer in the car to further check the man’s name. A felony Murder 2 warrant under the new name came back. Probable cause for the suspect had been developed and a warrant had been issued earlier in the month by one of our Traffic Collision Investigation Squad (TCIS) detectives for the suspect after a September 2012 collision in Belltown . One of the victims later died as a result of the collision.

The officers obtained the wanted bulletin and photo of the suspect issued by the detective and confirmed that it was the same suspect. The warrant was verified and the 47-year-old suspect was arrested. Officers later found the suspect’s driver’s license in his pocket. The suspect was later booked into the King County Jail.

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